Homemade bacong is SO worth it. I cheat a little, but it still works great. I "warm smoke" my bacon. Just my little saying for not truly cold smoking. I also make my own cooking charcoal out of oak deadfall I harvest from my land. If you drop a couple lumps of charcoal on your smudge once in a while it seems to boost the temp in the smokehouse enough to accelerate the bacon by up to a few days! The regular lump charcoal you buy for BBQ would work exactly the same.

Sure wish I could get my hands on some hickory and alder wood. Alder is the only wood to smoke bacon with IMO, but alas, the only way I can get it is by buying those bagged wood chips. Bah!

Nah Girly, when I say processed foods I'm talking about the "added" stuff - the fillers and shit they stick into it instead of the real or at least more natural shit - like using high fructose corn syrup instead of just cane sugar or maple syrup sugar.

And all the "fortification" they do to grains ... they wouldn't have to fortify it, if they hadn't have stripped all the nutrients out of it in the first place. And don't get me started on the amount of sodium they put in many canned products - it's ridiculous!

Preservatives are another thing altogether - some good, some not so good - hell, many people in my family "can" stuff and I know they have no idea what malto-dextrose even is! There are simply safer, more natural preservatives and yes, flash freezing is a great way to go for produce that needs to be shipped!

The thing is... when food is "made" by large corporate bakeries, they don't do it in small batches, they make everything in giant batches which require altering the original recipes... things need to be stretched out and because of that, they don't taste the same. In order to make stuff taste like the original, they add an over abundance of salts, sugars, fats, and yes, chemicals.
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Fantastic news Stark!! Keep doing what you're doing; whatever it is, it's keeping that shit out of your life.

A new type of thinking is essential if mankind is to survive and move to higher levels. ~ Albert Einstein

Apparently there are a lot of people who don't want all kinds of crap added to their food. Hormel came out with a line of cold cuts and bacon that has no additives. That's a pretty big company, so someone must be paying attention someplace.

Their additive-free salami is excellent. Haven't tried the bacon though.

Science is the process we've designed to be responsible for generating our best guess as to what the fuck is going on. Girly Man

Saw Bourdain roaming around Italy -
He met up with this Italian guy curing some kind of pig - a big hunk of it - it's aged and marinated in wine. He was air curing it and it took 2 whole years to do it. I'm not all that fond of pig but... but man, this air cured stuff looked so damn delicious! A beautiful, deep red color - just gorgeous.

To eat it, it was shaved super thin - you could see light through it. They served it with a little individual bowl of a lovely wine and some tomatoes and a crusty bread. Damn. It was about the size of a basket ball, but I could have eaten the entire thing.

Holy shit, I found it - it's called Culatello -
- Culatello (coo-lah-TEL-oh): More prized in Parma than prosciutto, culatello (little rear end) is made from one specific muscle in the hind quarters of a pig. The meat is traditionally seasoned and stuffed into a pig’s bladder, tied into a pear shape and hung to cure for 12 to 18 months. The fog that rolls through the Po valley, along with the region’s cold and windy winters, is said to contribute to culatello’s sweet flavor and rich texture. A lean, rosy red, raw Italian ham that has been cured and soaked in wine during aging. Considered superior, culatello has a clean, delicate flavor. It's often served as part of an antipasto platter.

Culatello.
I want.

A new type of thinking is essential if mankind is to survive and move to higher levels. ~ Albert Einstein

(27-09-2013 12:05 PM)Stark Raving Wrote: With the exception of a couple of tumors on the outside of my skull that were removed surgically, I treated myself SOLELY with food.

Seems to me that's one heck of an exception!

I think you misunderstand. The three tumors they removed were on the outside of my skull, and easy to access. In fact, calling their removal "surgery" is laughable. The other seven tumors were on the inside of my skull. Two of those were connected to my brain, the remaining five to the bone. The outside ones were removed because the doctors treating me decided that whatever it was I was doing was working (on all ten tumors) , and so why not remove the ones that were easy so my body could concentrate on the really threatening tumors.

(27-09-2013 12:05 PM)Stark Raving Wrote: This is the first time I've been willing to announce this publicly: I am officially (for now) cancer free.

You announce you have brain cancer in the Casual Coffee House...and announce you are rid of it in the FOOD section? WTF is wrong with you!?

That's awesome news! Incredible! I know we aren't best friends or anything, I don't even know you that well, but I was genuinely worried about you. People can call me a bitch all they want, I don't care. I'm very happy for you and glad you're healed!